G.I. American universities

In Spring 1945, the U.S. Army's Information and Educational Branch made formal plans to establish overseas university campuses for American service men and women, awaiting demobilization, or redeployment to another theater.

[2] Under General Samuel L. McCroskey, the hotels and casinos of Biarritz in France were converted into quarters, labs, and class spaces for U.S. service personnel.

The curriculum covered the range of subject of any state-side university, students established a full symphony orchestra, a choir, a theater group, and two basketball teams; a local hotel was rebuilt by the engineering class, a daily newspaper was published by the journalism program, and the theater program performed in local orphanages and hospitals.

The social highlight of the BAU's existence was a fashion show and beauty contest held as benefits for French war orphans, which Marlene Dietrich attended.

Service members were recruited as administrators and instructors in fields they were trained in prior to the war, hundreds of faculty were recruited from US colleges and universities, and administrative staff from multiple headquarters, including members of the British military such as Angela Vivian, a British civilian secretaries working at that time in Paris since the liberation.